Recent debates on secularization have long suggested that modernity would progressively diminish the role of religion and spiritual practices in both the public sphere and individual life. Yet the contemporary landscape points to a far more complex scenario. Alongside the decline of traditional religious affiliations, new forms of spirituality, contemplative practices, projects of self-transformation, and quests for meaning are emerging across profoundly diverse cultural contexts.

Today, these developments find a particularly fertile environment in digital technologies. Online spiritual communities, conversational agents employed for emotional, psychological, or spiritual support, as well as digital-native religions and platform-mediated ritual practices demonstrate that technology is no longer merely an external tool. Rather, it has become an environment within which new practices of subjectivity take shape, to the point that technology itself may come to function as a form of religion.

In this context, Michel Foucault's notion of technologies of the self acquires renewed significance. For Foucault, the term referred to the ensemble of practices through which individuals act upon themselves in order to transform their lives. Today, however, the word "technology" refers more concretely to material devices and intelligent systems that actively participate in these processes of subject formation. Practices of the self are thus increasingly intertwined with algorithms, digital platforms, and artificial intelligence, which do not merely mediate experience but actively contribute to shaping it.

This transformation also affects the relationship between death and transcendence. The proliferation of digital memorials, digital death practices, conversational avatars of the deceased, afterlife AI systems, and other forms of posthumous digital presence is reshaping the ways in which individuals process grief, maintain bonds with those who are absent, and imagine forms of continuity of identity beyond biological life. Likewise, the emergence of digital religions and AI-mediated spiritual practices raises unprecedented questions concerning the meaning of the sacred, religious experience, and transcendence.

As the modern relationship with the natural world becomes increasingly transformed, the very notion of the supernatural appears to be undergoing significant reconfiguration. The search for meaning, the care of the self, and experiences of transcendence do not disappear in technological societies; rather, they are reconfigured through new forms of technological mediation.

This evolving landscape raises important philosophical, ethical, and religious questions. Can digital technologies be understood as new technologies of the self? To what extent can artificial agents assume functions traditionally fulfilled by human relationships or spiritual practices? Can an artificial system be perceived as a guide, an authority, or even an "oracle"? How is the very idea of transcendence transformed when mediated by technological systems? What cultural and spiritual biases might these systems reproduce or amplify? Are we witnessing new possibilities for meaning-making, or rather new forms of technological delegation of religious and existential experience? Is it possible to design technologies that genuinely foster practices of self-care and spiritual inquiry without reducing such experiences to processes of algorithmic optimization or creating new forms of technological dependence?

The plurality of these contemporary spiritual expressions also calls for a comparative and intercultural perspective capable of bringing philosophical and religious traditions, symbolic practices, and imaginaries of the sacred into dialogue. From this perspective, can technology become an authentic space for self-transformation and openness to transcendence, or does it risk reducing spiritual and ethical experience to processes of optimization, simulation, and control? What opportunities and risks arise from the increasing delegation of emotional, relational, and spiritual functions to artificial systems?

This special issue seeks to bring together perspectives from philosophy, ethics, religious studies, anthropology, media studies, and artificial intelligence studies in order to explore how the emergence of digital technologies is transforming practices of the self, forms of human relationship, and contemporary modes of meaning-making.

Suggested topics include, but are not limited to:

• Digital spirituality and new forms of the sacred: meditation, contemplative practices, digital religions, and online spiritual communities at the intersection of religious experience, technological mediation, and the search for meaning;
• Memory, death, and transcendence in the digital age: digital memorials, digital death, afterlife AI, conversational avatars of the deceased, and emerging technological forms of mourning and relationships with absence;
• Technology, finitude, and new forms of immortality: the reconfiguration of identity, permanence, embodiment, and transcendence in light of digital technologies;
• Technology, well-being, and practices of self-transformation: digital mindfulness applications and related technologies, examined through the lenses of emancipation, surveillance, and new forms of governing subjectivity;
• Care of the self and artificial intelligence: the role of conversational AI, digital assistants, and intelligent systems in processes of subject formation, self-knowledge, emotional support, and personal transformation.

Submission Guidelines

Scholars interested in submitting a contribution are invited to send an abstract of no more than 500 words, followed by a bibliography, in both Italian and English, by 1 September 2026 to the following email addresses:

adriano.fabris@unipi.it

veronica.neri@unipi.it

silvia.dada@unipi.it

Cc: journals@edizioniets.com

The file should be named "Abstract Name Surname."

All abstracts will undergo an editorial review process. Authors will be notified of the outcome of their submission by 14 September 2026.

Authors of accepted abstracts will then be invited to submit the full manuscript through the electronic submission platform available on the journal's website (https://www.rivistateoria.eu/index.php/teoria/about/submissions) by 15 December 2026. All manuscripts will subsequently undergo the journal's peer-review process.

The Editorial Board reserves the right not to accept final manuscripts that differ substantially from the accepted abstracts or that do not successfully complete the peer-review process. The Board also reserves the right to request revisions in order to address the reviewers' comments and/or to ensure compliance with the journal's editorial standards.

Authors will receive the final decision regarding the acceptance of their manuscript, together with any requested revisions, by 15 January 2027. Revised versions of accepted manuscripts must be submitted by 31 January 2027.

All submissions must comply with the editorial guidelines of Teoria, available on the journal's website, and should not exceed 5,000 words (approximately 30,000 characters, including spaces).

Deadlines:

• Abstract submission (500 words + bibliography): 1 September 2026
• Notification of abstract acceptance: 14 September 2026
• Full manuscript submission (5,000 words): 15 December 2026
• Notification of final decision: 15 January 2027
• Submission of revised manuscripts: 31 January 2027

For technical assistance, please contact: journals@edizioniets.com